"A blog is to a writer what a canvas is to an artist." ~ Colleen Redman

Archive for December, 2008

~ The following year review was done by excerpting the first line in one post of each month. You can click on the name of the month for a full accounting. January – Warming up for a game with my poet friend, Mara, I put the Scrabble box by the woodstove after it sat in […]

My neighbor Dolphin lives and teaches in Alaska now. She brought bear meat for the Christmas Eve Yankee Swap. Cloe brought a woven cotton/silk scarf from her recent travels in Thailand, where she ate silkworms and grasshoppers and worked on behalf of rural villagers’ right to sustainable culture. There was salmon caviar on the kitchen […]

1. Click HERE for my Virtual Christmas Message brought to you by the Auburn School Choir, of which my great-niece is a member. 2. My husband Joe, a counselor, recently expressed to me that he was glad our relationship was strong and that we didn’t need to see a counselor. “But you are a counselor,” […]

1. It was a rainy night, five days before Christmas, so I wasn’t expecting much of a turnout for the third Saturday Spoken Word night at the Café Del Sol. But when I arrived, I flung open the door and there was Darth Vader, Mrs. Claus, and a birthday party with cake being passed around […]

Mrs. Claus at the local café is a new take on the Department Store Santa. Ann Bower, a.k.a. Mrs. Claus, says she has a direct line to Santa. “I tell Santa what they want,” she said about the children who sit on her lap and reveal their Christmas wishes to her. Children and the young […]

1. Who let the air out of Christmas? Driving to Christiansburg on Monday I passed a yard full of plastic blow-up Christmas ornaments deflated and spread out on the law. It looked like a Christmas massacre. 2. I was on my way to visit my dear friend Alwyn for a Christmas tea. Alwyn is an […]

At some point in your life one of your kids or someone else might say, “You’re no fun anymore.” You might feel obligated to try and be more fun or you might begin to ponder how your idea of what fun is has changed. Fun is a beautiful combination of words that comes without effort, […]

There were 19 wines to sample and I liked them all. I tried not to get drunk and started thinking that maybe I should have eaten more hors d’oeuvres when we were only half-way through the red wines. By the time we were on to the whites, I had struck up conversations with the guests […]

1. The Red Carpet 2. Two Mannequins and a Man 3. Cherry Garcia 4. Country Sleigh Photos: 1. Taken at a hotel in at National Harbor, DC, where we recently saw Cirque du Soleil. 2. A man decking the halls at the Winter Sun Clothing Outlet. 3. Santa passing out candy canes at the Dickens […]

~ The Following photos appeared with others in The Floyd Press on December 11, 2008. 1. I remember the early days of Winterfest, selling my jewelry in the old unheated Jacksonville dairy barn. One year I set my craft table up next to Katie and her partner who were selling handmade hats. I bought one […]

1. I used to sign my kid’s Christmas presents SANTA and change my handwriting so they wouldn’t guess it was me. When they got older I signed them SANTA MARIA just for the fun of it. 2. I was recently typing “5 O’clock” and found myself wondering if it was Irish time. 3. I don’t […]

Things move fast in the world according to Bryce. One week he’s repeatedly sticking out his tongue, the next week he’s eating bananas. One week he’s teething on toys and shaking rattles, the next he’s all about his new Playschool bus. So I guess I’ll be trading in the rattle I bought him for Christmas […]

~ The following was published in The Floyd Press on December 4, 2008. Natural Awakenings of Southwest Virginia made its debut appearance in November. The 32 page magazine, printed on recycled newsprint with soy based inks, is a monthly guide to “healthier, more natural and environmentally friendly living,” writes publisher Stacy Hairfield in the premier […]

In 1982, a troupe of young street performers mixed with the crowd of tourists, artists and collectors in Baie-Saint-Paul, the Mecca of Quebec painters … Walking on stilts, the entertainers juggled and breathed fire. Inspired by the vacationers’ obvious delight, the performers organized the Baie-Saint-Paul entertainer’s festival, where the public witnessed the beginning of what […]

I belong to a Share the Care circle. It’s a group of people who have agreed to alternate monthly home visits to someone with health issues who has asked for help. Occasionally we all get together for fellowship and a simple meal. My Share the Care home visits got off to a rough start, a […]

About

From the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia I write to synthesize what I'm learning at the time, whether it be poetry, a political commentary, or a letter to my mother in Hull, Massachusetts, where I'm originally from. Whenever I don't know exactly what it is I'm doing and it borders on wasting my time, I call it research. 'Dear Abby, How can I get rid of freckles?' was my first published piece at the age of 11.